CheeseIsGood's Million Dollar Musings - MLB DFS Strategy: Friday, August 5th

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Happy Thursday! We’ve got an 8-game slate with a pretty good mix of everything. You can find a reason to spend up or down at both pitching and hitting, and make a case for most stacks, or power hunting with individual bats. I end up with a very condensed player pool on both sides, which is a nice change from the ‘hey, play a little bit of everything’ place I’ve landed on a lot of recent slates.

The weather is just a little sketchy in a few spots, but for now, I’m just assuming everything is a full go. I would just recommend tuning into Crunchtime to double check, especially if you’re joining me in playing Jeffrey Springs in Detroit.

Thursday Night Pitching

I quickly see two tiers of pitchers, based as much on pricing than skills. I am quickly crossing most of the pitchers of the off my list tonight and ending up with a condensed pool:

An Ace And Three Other Guys

Justin Verlander at Guardians – 25.6% K, 4.6% BB, 1.81 ERA, 3.36 SIERA
Alek Manoah at Twins – 22.6% K, 5.2% BB, 2.43 ERA, 3.73 SIERA
Kyle Wright at Mets – 24% K, 7.2% BB, 2.93 ERA, 3.52 SIERA
Carlos Carrasco vs Braves – 23.1% K, 6.4% BB, 3.79 ERA, 3.65 SIERA

justin-verlander-800x480

These are four good pitchers, as evidenced by their ERA’s, SIERA’s and low walk rates. But I am equally as uninspired by their lack of ace-level strikeout ability. Justin Verlander has quite clearly the best skill set here with both the highest strikeout rate as well as the lowest walk rate, all of which gives him the best real-life numbers as well. He is also as steady as they come with pitch count and innings, going at least six innings in 16 of his 19 starts and reaching 7+ innings in 7 of his last 10. This matchup does nothing to help his strikeout upside, but that’s not really what we’re paying for here. What I will say on Verlander, as well as the rest of this top tier, is that I don’t see this as a must-spend pitcher slate. But if you’re spending, Verlander is heads and shoulders above the others for me. On DK, he should be the chalk, and while I’ll play him anywhere he fits, I won’t sacrifice everything else to get there. On FD, I’m even less inclined to force him in, but again, if I have the salary without too much issue, he’s absolutely the SP1.

The next closest thing to Verlander is Alek Manoah. He’s a similar style of pitcher, where he’s much more about innings and control and less about per-inning strikeout upside. His matchup gives him more strikeouts than what Verlander faces, but there’s also a lot of power risk here. He left his last start early after being hit on the elbow, but reports are that he is a full go here with no concerns. I do not like him enough to want to pay up for double-aces on DK, while on both sites, he’s priced so close to Verlander that he is simply a good leftover for me tonight.

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About the Author

CheeseIsGood
Dave Potts (CheeseIsGood)

One of the preeminent baseball minds in all of fantasy, Dave Potts (aka CheeseIsGood) has won contests at the highest levels of both season-long and DFS. He is a 2x winner of a $1,000,000 1st-place prize in DFS, having won the 2014 FanDuel baseball Live Final and following that up by taking down a DraftKings Milly Maker Tournament in 2015. In addition, he’s won the Main Event championship in the National Fantasy Baseball Championship and the NFBC Platinum League, which is the highest buy-in entry league. His consistent success in the NFBC tournaments earned him a prestigious spot in their Hall of Fame. Dave can also strum a mean guitar while carrying a tune, and if you’re lucky, you’ll see him do so on one of his MLB Crunch Time appearances. Follow Dave on X – @DavePotts2